I was flipping around on the TV last night. And I came accross the TMNT movie on one of the movie channels, I think it might've been on one of the Starz channels. I caught roughly the last half hour. It's still as great as I remember it being. Like the first five seasons of the 4Kids series, I think it had exactly the right tone for a TMNT cartoon.

In terms of animation, it's aged brilliantly. It looked gorgeous then and still looks fantastic now.

The actual film though, like others have said, is just kind of there. The character work is great (if a little too Leo/Raph centric) but the villains were just dull. As a quasi sequel they should have just gone with a loose adaptation of City at War. It would have kept the theme of moving on after defeating Shredder and the guys divided, applied that to the antagonists as well (Karai and Foot Elite). That said, it's easy to judge these things with hindsight.

I swear, the animation just gets better with time. I'm amazed at how good this movie's visuals look 11 years later.

The action scenes are really great, too. I love the whole Nightwatcher idea and would love to see more incarnations expand on it. Leo and Raph arguing for half a movie isn't anything new, but I really do like it. Some of the dialogue is hopelessly juvenile but some of it is pretty fun.

The story being a clustered mess and many characters being underused keep this movie back from being my favorite TMNT movie, which I guess says a whole lot about my opinion on most TMNT movies.

I swear, the animation just gets better with time. I'm amazed at how good this movie's visuals look 11 years later.

The action scenes are really great, too. I love the whole Nightwatcher idea and would love to see more incarnations expand on it. Leo and Raph arguing for half a movie isn't anything new, but I really do like it. Some of the dialogue is hopelessly juvenile but some of it is pretty fun.

The story being a clustered mess and many characters being underused keep this movie back from being my favorite TMNT movie, which I guess says a whole lot about my opinion on most TMNT movies.

Agreed. Itís my second favourite tmnt movie behind TMNT 1990.

__________________
Donatello: The tracker. It might work.
Raphael: Shrewd move, Donatello. If we ignore the problem, it might go away by itself. (from The Mean Machines)

This is one of my favorite Turtle movies. Second favorite out of the six we've got, actually.

The plot is weak, for sure, and the villains are forgettable - but I like that they tried something different and original. They didn't rehash Shredder, but alluded to him coming back if there was a sequel. The Turtles are pretty spot on in terms of characterization, and the Raph/Leo beef (which is usually played out) has a new spin on it that feels worth it. I love the look of the Turtles. Looks like a natural evolution of the OG Turtles into the CGI era. The voice acting was good all the way around and Morpheus narrated (haha).

I love this movie and Idk if I'd say it gets better over time, but I like it now the same way I liked it when it released.

I watched this for the first time a year ago. It was enjoyable overall. The animation was great, it had some of the best turtle designs of any of the incarnations, and the soundtrack was very good. The dialogue was better than the Bay movies, but the plot could have been better.
As for the characters: Mikey and Don really got shoved into the background. I have to agree with other posters here, that there was too much focus on Raph and Leo (and I'm a huge Leo fan!). I didn't care for this version of Splinter, either, which was surprising since I absolutely adored Mako's Uncle Iroh from Avatar: The Last Airbender.

It's definitely the second-best TMNT movie by default, although that's admittedly a low bar. After TMNT 1990, the rest of the movies have ranged from "Kind of okay, if you're a kid" to "I hope everyone who made this gets herpes" in quality. But this one holds up pretty well, even though it's kind of a mess. Like, the A plot with Winters and the Monsters was cluttered and stupid but the subplots were all infinitely more interesting. Like, if you'd simplified, gotten rid of the Monsters stuff and made one of the B-Plots the main plot, you've instantly got a better movie. They didn't need to change a LOT; they had a lot of great pieces, but they tried to do too much all at once and it kind if messed it up.

There's a lot of great moments in it, and visually it's quite interesting. It's just very over-stuffed.

Oddly, although I like it okay, I rarely have any compulsion to watch it. It's fine but it seems to have not made a lasting impression with a lot of people, and I kind of get that.

__________________"I left some words quite far from here to be a short reminder...
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nWo Tech: The Official Thread Poison of the Technodrome Forumshttps://www.youtube.com/channel/UCxr...awnHgDz1ceDcfA

Mikey and Don really got shoved into the background. I have to agree with other posters here, that there was too much focus on Raph and Leo (and I'm a huge Leo fan!).

I think it was a mistake retreading the Leo/Raph squabbling with the rooftop battle just being a fan service for Mirage readers. I didn't want a ten minute fight between them, I wanted them to carry on with the story.

For the sake of discussion, Iíll echo that Iíd place Secret of the Ooze above this film. I donít mean to constantly rag on it - like you all said, it does a lot right. And I can see how it might represent the turtles better than SoTO. It tries to center itself around family conflict, which I appreciate.

But at the end of the day, I much rather spend time around the SoTO turtles. Their personalities are vibrant, their conversations are funny, and they look so damn cool in those Henson suits. Most of what was special about the first film was lost in SoTO, but even the special elements that remain are enough for me to put it above 07.

My favorite thing about "Secret of the Ooze" is that it has put over $20 million into Kevin Nash's bank account since 1991, for a single afternoon's work, most of which time was spent getting in and out of costume.

No, really; you have not seen a person express True Joy in this life until you see the twinkle in a grown man's eye, as he describes "getting paid ten grand to walk to the mailbox every few weeks" thanks to a kids' movie they made in a beer-buzz haze 30 years ago. I'd rub everyone's nose in it too. Good for him.

Aside from that, the film irritates me. "Ma-MA!" and "Combat cold cuts!" and "Traditional Pre-Fight Donuts" aren't really very funny past age 8, and aside from that the movie really doesn't do anything. And f*ck Vanilla Ice right in the ear.

Part of me almost understands why some people dig that movie, and part of me totally doesn't. Don't get me wrong, I thought it was fine when I was 7, same as everyone... by the time I was 10, I realized it wasn't good, and didn't feel like clinging to something for nostalgic reasons since I wasn't all that in love with it in the first place. I realized it wasn't good, and just moved on. I rarely feel any urge to watch it, just because "It's TMNT!" That's not enough reason for me to endure things I don't care for, even if they're based on things I like. Very rarely I'll marathon the original trilogy, but that's the only time I'll bother with that one or part III.

I mean... like, aside from not even being very competently written, or shot, or executed - the whole thing feels a LOT like a Made-For-TV film, as does the third - it's not even a good sequel to the first one, given all the tonal and logical inconsistencies. It's clearly supposed to be the same universe, but... nothing fits at all. It doesn't feel the same. And I know a lot of that is by design, but I f*cking haaaaaate when movies do that. I call it the "This Movie In The Series Never Watched The Last Movie In The Series" syndrome.

I know that, for a lot of people, "Cowabunga!" and pizza jokes are literally ALL they need in their TMNT entertainment, or for it to "feel like TMNT" to them. Well... I am not of your tribe, I do not speak your language, and I really, really don't understand any of it. TMNT II is, by no definition at all, a "good" movie. That doesn't make it unwatchable, but... I'd have a very hard time saying it's "better" than... well, ANY movie, except for like, the Ghostbusters reboot and things like that, which are not only totally unwatchable but also shouldn't exist. So sure, it's better than THAT, but... what does that really say?

I'unno. I think TMNT 2007 is, at worst, mediocre and forgettable but harmless. I think "Secret of the Ooze" actually did physical damage to the brand that it still hasn't fully recovered from, and may never. Playfulness and nostalgia aside, I can't abide things like that.

__________________"I left some words quite far from here to be a short reminder...
I laid them out in stone, in case they need to last forever...""But hey... I'm not telling you anything that you don't already know."
nWo Tech: The Official Thread Poison of the Technodrome Forumshttps://www.youtube.com/channel/UCxr...awnHgDz1ceDcfA

I’m just looking at it in terms of entertainment value. 07 jokes fall flatter for me and there’s really no fun to be had. The family dynamic is there, the ninjas are fighting on rooftops, etc. on paper it’s great, but it turns out to be the blandest soup I’ve ever had.
I think that whereas 07 tries to be something great and ends up extremely neutered and disappointing, SoTO is just a plain old crapstorm of a 90’s children’s movie with some loveable characters and great suits. In my mind, at least.

Two more final notes on 07:
- the comedy sinks lower than SoTO for me. The kitchen diner/Black Betty scene feels like pandering on a level I can’t even describe.
- there are some seriously gorgeous sequences sprinkled throughout. I love seeing the turtles flipping across rooftops at night early on in the film.

Well, to be fair... generally, I'll take a mediocre cover of "Black Betty" over NO Black Betty at all, so... forgivable sin?

I feel ya, though; one movie aimed for the low/middle and hit the mark, the other aimed a bit too high and collapsed on itself. I tend to reward aspiration, myself, but it could be argued that TMNT II did a better job in doing what it was trying to do.

__________________"I left some words quite far from here to be a short reminder...
I laid them out in stone, in case they need to last forever...""But hey... I'm not telling you anything that you don't already know."
nWo Tech: The Official Thread Poison of the Technodrome Forumshttps://www.youtube.com/channel/UCxr...awnHgDz1ceDcfA

I think all TMNT movies except for TMNT 2014 (of which there is reportedly three whole entirely separate versions that exist in the editing room... and it shows) succeeded in being exactly what kind of movie they set out to be.